Firearms have a low effectiveness for a number of reasons, even in the case where a high quality firearm is used. Some of the problems include movement (shaking) by the user (the main issue); movement of the target (e.g. a live target such as a combatant or criminal); relative aiming—such as the range to the target and inclination angle (ballistics), dynamic issues of the firearm (e.g. heating up of the barrel during use); atmospheric/ambient conditions (e.g. wind, fog, elevation, etc); and visualization of the target (i.e. the target may be temporarily hidden and not in a line of sight position for aiming). On the police force, it is common that most firing results in a miss; and in combat, the vast majority of firing results in a miss. Furthermore, there are also frequent issues with friendly soldiers being killed or wounded by so called “friendly fire”.
At least some of the aforementioned issues are addressed in US 2006/005,447 “Processor aided firing of small arms” (Lenner et al); EP 0,605,290 “Optronic shooting aid device for hand weapon and its application to progress in a hostile environment” (Fertala); and U.S. Pat. No. 5,822,713 “Guided fire control system” (Profeta).
US 2006/005,447 discloses a weapon comprising: a firearm having a barrel and a user interface; a barrel oscillator for oscillating the barrel in a predetermined pattern; an image capture device mounted on the firearm for capturing a plurality of image (video) frames of a target and generating image data in response thereto; at least one barrel motion sensor mounted on the firearm for sensing a motion of the barrel and generating motion data in response thereto; and a processor coupled to: the user interface, the image capture device and the at least one barrel motion sensor. The processor enables a user to select a target by freezing one of the video frames, selecting the target, thereby causing the image capture device to capture the plurality of images and generate the image data which is used along with the motion data to determine a predicted target location and coverage point where the barrel covers the target upon which the processor may energize the firearm to fire a projectile. The firearm requires at least one barrel motion sensor in the case of non-static targets.
EP 0,605,290 relates to the field of aids for shooting a hand weapon, and is based on a wide field/narrow field coupling for target recognition and marking, combined with automatic target tracking and conditional triggering of shooting. The helmet of an infantryman is equipped with a wide-field sensor, the output signal from which is applied to a monitor integrated into the helmet. The weapon of the infantryman is equipped with an optical system with a narrow-field sensor coupled to a tracker and multiple control means. The multiple control means controls a video change-over switch that applies the imagery signal originating either from the wide-field sensor or from the narrow-field sensor to the monitor), the tracker for acquiring a target and a comparator for triggering firing means when the coordinates of the target, calculated by an angular deviation measurement device are equal to those of a predetermined reference.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,822,713 discloses a fire control system comprising a manually aimed gun having a sighting device and a device for acquiring a target. The target acquiring device (e.g. infrared imaging device or FLIR device) is disposed at a location remote from the gun. The fire control system also comprises a device for determining the trajectory of the target with respect to the gun and providing information relating to the target to the sighting device of the gun such that an operator of the gun can aim the gun with respect to the sighting device to hit the target when the gun is fired. The determining device is in communication with the target acquiring device and the sighting device. Profeta also discloses a fire control method for a minor caliber gun comprising the steps of acquiring a target from a location which is remote from the gun; determining the trajectory of the target with respect to the gun; providing information relating to the target to a sighting device of the gun; and manually aiming the gun in accordance with the information appearing on the sighting device such that the gun is aimed to accurately hit the target when fired. However, the remote targeting device makes verification of possible line of sight firing questionable.
Other related publications include: US 2006/201,047 “Rifle scope with image stabilization” (Lowrey); U.S. Pat. No. 7,421,816 “Weapon sight” (Conescu); U.S. Pat. No. 7,089,845 “Aiming a weapon barrel” (Firedli); WO 98/051,987 “Video sighting unit for rifles” (Becker); US 2008/039962 “Firearm system for data acquisition and control” (McRae); U.S. Pat. No. 3,659,494 “Fire control system for use in conjunction with electronic image motion stabilization systems” (Philbrick et al); and U.S. Pat. No. 5,392,688 “Trigger for a firing weapon” (Boutet et al).